The Bad News
by zevie
Summary: Set post novel. Tim Shepard's response to the events of the novel.


The Bad News  
  
A/N: I'm back! Miss me? Anyway, I got bored of the other story, so I'm starting something else, which will probably be only one chapter. It's all the idea of ElvenNight, who graciously reviewed my other story. THANK YOU! It's gotten me outta my rut, off my ass and into the game again, excuse the crude language. My Saviour.  
  
P.S. By the way, this thing is rated pg-13 at least, because of language (YES the f-word a couple of times) and well…I think that's it, other than a teeny, tiny, unnoticeable innuendo. It's totally needless. But it was fun to write and hey, it's me. It has to be there. Anyway, I've blithered enough. Enjoy please!  
  
P.P.S. It's not so good, not terrible, but not so good, but review anyway?  
  
~  
  
On the East Side of town, in a tiny house on Girvin Street, sitting on his arse in the living room, was a notorious hood and self-declared enemy of the world – Timothy Shepard. He was puffing on a cigarette, half-listening to his parents fight, and contemplating the fact that once finished his smoke it would be a damned hard job of finding enough money to buy another one. He had just decided that it would be in his best interest to nab his brother Curly and bully him into giving up his weeds when the doorbell rang. Tim listened more intently, waiting for his mother, or father or siblings to answer the door. But his parents were still fighting, loud as ever, and he could faintly hear the thudding bass on his sister Angela's tape player. She obviously hadn't heard the doorbell, she was busy drowning herself in beers and Elvis in her private room (the only private room in the house, which Tim had always resented her for having). He'd been in her room once before, to "borrow" her lighter, but had quickly fled upon being greeted with a bunch of flowery smells, wailing Beatles music, and unmentionable girlish clothing, which he had formerly chose not to believe his sister wore. After stealing Curly's lighter instead, Tim had decided then and there to never go near his sister's room again, even to tell her that the house was on fire.  
  
So now, groaning loudly about having to move (not that anybody cared, or even heard) Tim got up from the floor and went to go see who it was who kept ringing his doorbell. He yanked open the door and found himself nose to chin with the breed of human he considered himself to be completely against.  
  
"You Timothy Shepard?" the cop asked in a bored tone. They always sounded bored when talking to him and Tim almost told this one (as he'd told many others before) that maybe if the policeman dropped this goody-two-shoesy shit and did something productive with his life he wouldn't be so bored. But such comments usually led to a smack upside the head, so he held his tongue.  
  
"What the hell do you want?" he asked instead.  
  
The cop held up a dark leather jacket and knife, his mouth curling into a sardonic smile. "Recognise anything?"  
  
Tim's mind was racing, trying to remember if he'd left his jacket at the scene of any of the crimes he'd committed lately. "I dunno," he replied stupidly.  
  
The cop stepped aside, revealing another tall, broad-shouldered man. Tim knew this one.  
  
"Darrel Curtis. What the hell are you doing on my property."  
  
Tim meant it as a joke, but Darry scowled. "I know some stuff you might wanna know. S'all I came by for. You don't wanna know, I'll take it somewhere else."  
  
Tim shrugged. He was curious. "Whatever." He held the door open for Darry, eyeing the cop as he made a motion towards the greaser.  
  
1 The policeman caught Tim's look, and backed off wearily, handing Tim the jacket and flicking the switchblade closed before sliding it into a plastic bag.  
  
Back in the living room Darry was looking around. He didn't seem himself, all jittery. But then Tim didn't know him very well anyway.  
  
"So what do you want."  
  
Darry eyed Tim carefully. He was definitely looking uncomfortable.  
  
"Let's sit down," he said quietly, and plopped himself down on the couch. Tim didn't sit. He tossed the dark jacket across the room and glared at Darry.  
  
"I said 'what do you want'. Or do I have to beat it outta ya?"  
  
Darry looked up at him unflinchingly, his eyes tired and sad. "Listen man, this is really important. Just sit down okay?"  
  
Tim plunked himself down in an armchair then looked at Darrel expectantly.  
  
Darry stared back at Tim. Then suddenly he reached into his pocket, drawing forth a tiny plastic bag full of green leaves.  
  
"You got paper?" he asked huskily. Tim shrugged, tearing a piece out of his school textbook. He didn't ask any questions watching Darry roll the joint. Free weed was not something Tim came by often.  
  
The two smoked in silence for a few minutes. Slowly, Tim began to feel relaxed. He wasn't listening to his parents or Angela's booming tape player anymore. He was sitting in a chair, which seemed to get more and more comfortable and waiting for Darry to give him his news.  
  
Darry was staring at his shoes. He took several quick puffs off his dying joint, and then put it out on the arm of the couch.  
  
"Well," Tim asked finally.  
  
The tips of Darry's ears went red, his eyes glued to the carpet beneath his feet. His face flushed slowly, and without looking at Tim he said quietly:  
  
"Dally's dead."  
  
Tim inhaled one last time and ground out his joint too. He felt hazy, tired, and he was no longer interested in Darry's problems. What did he care if Dallas pissed off the Curtis brother? "What'd he do," he said lazily.  
  
Darry looked up quickly, then back down. "Jumped in front of a bunch of cops. Waved a gun. Got shot-" he stopped, drawing a breath, "thirteen times." Darry's said all of this quickly, softly, not looking quite upset, but not looking quite like everything was all right either.  
  
Tim looked at him. Looked and looked until it suddenly clicked in that Darry wasn't just mad at Dally. Dallas wasn't gonna get no beating from the football playing greaser, not now, not ever again. Dallas was dead.  
  
Tim's jaw dropped. No way. No fucking way.  
  
"You're joking."  
  
"I wouldn't joke about this Tim," Darry said.  
  
Tim's mind was reeling. He'd just talked to Dally yesterday morning, gone to see him in the hospital. Hell, Tim could remember the whole conversation nearly. Dally was yapping about Johnny, on and on and on. He was drugged, so Tim didn't hold it against him, just let him talk.  
  
"You know Tim, it ain't smart the shit we do," Dally had said at one point and Tim had laughed so hard he nearly fell off his chair.  
  
"I mean it," Dally added, and he certainly looked serious enough. "Fighting and stuff. Gonna get us all killed and then where will we be?" He stopped, tipping his head to the side, that dippy look on his face that he got whenever the doctors gave him drugs. "Dead probably," he said thoughtfully. He sat up tall, fidgeting in the hospital bed. "I'm gonna be good now," he said to Tim. "No more fighting."  
  
Tim laughed again, and decided to bring the stupid kid back to reality. "Do you actually have a brain or do you just open your mouth and spew and occasionally, accidentally, by the sheer coincidence of luck, manage to say something remotely intelligent?"  
  
It had been one of his better comebacks. He'd dreamed it up years ago when he'd had to copy the "r" section of the dictionary down during detention, and had come across the word "remote". Tim was pretty proud of that one.  
  
But then Dally had thrown his lunch tray at Tim's head. Tim left quickly after that. Stupid kid had no respect for the amount of thought he'd put into that insult.  
  
Darry was looking at him worriedly. "You all right?"  
  
Tim ignored him.  
  
The weed had gone to his head and all he could think of was how close he and Dally had been. They'd met when Dally was barely 13, and Tim was 17. He'd taught him everything. How to use a switchblade, chain, everything about heaters, how to smoke, and roll cigarettes, and how to fuck a girl (though before he was 13, Dally had tried enough times to impress even Tim). On one particularly drunken night, he'd even taught Dally how to kiss right, though both of them had sworn never to even think of it again. No way could that kid be gone.  
  
"Tim," Darry yelped in his ear. "Goddamn it! Come back to life! It's not the end of the world…"  
  
Again, Tim ignored him.  
  
How many times had he told Dallas that this was exactly the way he'd end up? How many times had he laughed at the tow-headed teen when Dally had excitedly reported some needless crime he'd committed? Told him that stuff like that was gonna get him killed and he'd better be ready for it when it happened. Stupid kid went and died the way Tim had predicted anyway. The way everyone had predicted he'd go.  
  
"Goddamn," Tim murmured finally.  
  
"Yeah," Darry agreed, relieved that Tim had spoken.  
  
"What a waste."  
  
Darry snorted. "Of what?"  
  
Tim looked up angrily. "Man, we were friends," he said. Him and Dally right? Weren't they?  
  
Darry gave him a funny look. "No. You were the same kind a person that's all. You weren't really friends. Goddamn it Tim, if I'd known you'd act like this I'd have never given you any weed."  
  
Darry! Always acting the fucking parent. Before he knew what he was doing, he'd hauled Darry up by his collar and kicked him out.  
  
An hour later, finally sober and sitting in his arse in his living room again, Tim stared up at the ceiling and thought to himself  
  
'Dally's gone'.  
  
But before he could get upset, he remembered again what Darry said, and that they weren't really close, or friends hardly. Just two of a kind. And now he was alone. He took a drag off Curly's cigarette and thought: "Fuck it."  
  
Dally was gone and Tim, like everybody else, decided not to give a damn. 


End file.
